Friday, October 12, 2012

Welcome back to our political communications
professor Allan Louden of Wake Forest University, along with his
students, who are here to break down last night's vice presidential debate.

Louden,
a national champion debate coach who has worked with politicians such
as Elizabeth Dole, graded speeches and debate performances for us in
2008. His analysis was one of our most popular features at the O during the 2008 election, and this year, he's added a student perspective.

So how did Joe Biden and Paul Ryan do? Louden goes first, followed by his students, followed by their final grades.

Louden:

The 90 minutes of “political enlightenment” emanating
from Kentucky
was a distinctly unpleasant experience; having that uncomfortable feeling of
witnessing friends bicker, showing disregard. Vice Presidential debates have the power to overshadow the
main events, as when Cheney and Lieberman met on the same stage in 2000, or Benson evoked
Kennedy in Omaha.
This debate felt like the warm-up act, uplifting Obama and Romney as heads of the
ticket.

So what happened? Who won?

The debate likely will be remembered as largely a draw, each
candidate resonating with their base, each confirming voter’s shared sense of persona, each
having moments, but also disappointment; all within a very short media cycle

It could be credibly observed that debate winner and the
debate loser was the same person, Joe Biden. Biden animated enough to perhaps stem the
campaign drift, but he embarrassed with paltriness seemingly unfit to his office. He was more aggressive, often
interrupting, animated to the point of crossing from impolite to insolent. He split his time between
sounding knowledgeable and disgorging political claptrap. He flexed from calm reason to scolding father.

Ryan did not lose, holding the line, raising doubts, all
without gaffes; crossing some threshold. But neither did he win, sounding too often the exponent of
partisan frames, competent but not fresh. It is possible to get bored midstream in an answer, even as it
demonstrates the source’s knowledge. Ryan remained wonkish even when wrapped in personal stories. He
stood his ground, but seldom surged to a memorable tenor.

In most debates there are flashes when we’re rivited, when
we forget our self-awareness that we are watching the debate. In this debate I was ever
mindful of being an observer.

The students:

Lillis Hendrickson on the candidate’s response to the
opening question on Libya:

The beginning of the vice presidential debate opened with a
discussion on the death of ambassador Chris Stephen in Benghazi, Libya
and the “massive intelligence failure” that it represented on the part of the United States. Biden began by
asserting that the government is currently working to figure out who planned this attack and why, which he said is much more than
Governor Romney’s action of “holding press conferences.”

Ryan came back with an attack on defense
cuts, drawing incredulous smiles and headshakes from Biden, who dubbed Ryan’s assertions “a bunch
of malarkey,” citing evidence of the end of the War on Iraq
during Obama’s administration and the upcoming withdraw from Afghanistan by
2014.

Ryan tried to downplay his support of defense by reducing his position to that of “peace, democracy, and individual rights.” That sounds like
something I’d be on board with, but it was undercut by his qualification that under Romney, troops in Afghanistan
would be beginning their exodus in 2014.

Overall, the candidates stuck to the question at hand, and answered each
other on a fairly point-to-point basis.

Brandon Ng on the discussion of Iran and Foreign Policy:

As soon as moderator Martha Raddatz introduced the topic of Iran into the
debate, both Ryan and Biden came out swinging. On the issue of preventing Iran from
amassing and constructing weapons of mass destruction, Ryan immediately questioned Obama’s
“watered down sanctions” on Iran
and claimed they were closer to possessing nuclear weapons
because of Obama’s policies. He worked very hard to discredit Obama’s foreign policy by hammering
the point that Obama has not protected Americans who are overseas, and allowed Iran to gain
grounds on producing nuclear weapons.

However, Biden literally laughed off Ryan’s claims and
aggressively and decisively maintained that the Obama government has not, and will not, allow Iran to posses
nuclear weapons. While both candidates have been aggressive all evening, Biden’s passion was
bursting from the seams, and his voice overpowered Ryan’s. He was comical and seems to be more at ease than his
counterpart, Paul Ryan. While both represented their sides well, I give Joe Biden the unanimous
decision over Paul Ryan.

And bringing it back to domestic policy, April Walsh
responds to the candidates handling of Medicare and Social Security:

The Medicare/ Social Security issue remains a hot topic.
Paul Ryan attempted to show how the Obama Care board will not only be a waste of time and money,
but also energy and human lives. Ryan claimed that the qualifications for the board don’t even
include past medical training. To further persuade the audience, Ryan claimed that money for Obama Care is
taken from Medicare and will continue to do so each year. The fact checkers must be going crazy.

Joe
Biden retaliated by stating that Republicans don’t even like Medicare. Biden continually tried to turn
the discussion to a matter of trust. Who do we trust to take care of our health: Romney’s voucher or
Obama’s board?

Undoubtedly, the strongest responses from the room
were after Vice President Biden’s use of the word, “malarkey,” and his statement to Mr. Ryan,
“Oh, so you’re Jack Kennedy now?” The tone reflected a curious mix of disbelief and humor in the tone
Biden used toward his opponent. The constant smiles and chuckling created a rather peculiar mix of policy
and heckling at times, but at the end of the 90 minutes, both candidates crafted strong points and held
their ground.

Perhaps the strongest moments of the debate were at the end, when Martha Raddatz questioned
the candidates about their religious beliefs, and finally, after one 90 minute presidential debate, and
another 83 minutes of the vice presidential debate, women’s issues were finally approached. The stage
has been set for the second and third debates now, with Biden creating momentum for the president
after his dismally quiet performance last week, and new issues have been introduced that will
undoubtedly be addressed in the next two weeks.

14
comments:

Wow...sure wish we could get an unbiased opinion from a non liberal writer.Everyone knows professors are very liberal,so this "grade" was like asking a cowboys fan what they think about the redskins.All my republican friends say biden was a clown and was very unprofessional,while ryan won in a "slam dunk." I am anxious to hear from others.The polls definately swung in favor of romney after last weeks debate,so i go more with facts than what the left wing observer writes,but we are pretty much forced to read it!

Might've been nice to grade the so-called moderator too. Long-time friend of Joe Biden, who attended her wedding. I found her to be very ineffective and biased, declining to stop Biden from interupting but quick to cut Ryan on with a "let's move on...".

No question Ryan won on solutions and substance for 1) ways to turn around the economy, 2) preserving Social Security & Medicare, and 3) confronting Irans nuclear ambitions but I really really really enjoyed Biden. I thought he was great fun and fairly harmless with his peripheral antics and facial expressions.

Please DON'T turn down the sound and watch it! Listen more to what they say, not the pageantry with which they said it, and you'll get much closer to the truth. As conservative Charles Krauthammer said on Fox freakin' News: on substance it was a tie (he said both had points to make and both made them effectively), if you listened on the radio Biden won easily, if you watched it on TV he lost. That's not necessarily my own opinion of how it went down, but deciding someone lost because you didn't like they way they smiled is a pretty childlike way to approach something as important as a national election.

radio won, tv lost - see Kennedy/Nixon and let me know how that turned out. Biden is a huge joke, a tool, a laughingstock. Anyone that says or thinks otherwise is fully uninformed or in the tank. Ryan resoundingly kicked ol Joe's ass last night.

If you want to know the outcome of the debate, look at the Observer. If it was a Biden win, it would have been plastered across the website, instead we get an opinion piece tucked into a corner. Biden showed us who he really was, and instead of arguing the issues, he elected to argue,and interrupt Ryan throughout the debate. I wish we could have a round two between them.

I'm curious as to how you thought Ryan confronted Iran's nuclear ambitions, considering these statements:

Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz, head of the Israeli military (IDF):

"[Iran] is going step by step to the place where it will be able to decide whether to manufacture a nuclear bomb. It hasn't decided to go the extra mile."

"I don't think [Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei] will want to go the extra mile. I think the Iranian leadership is composed of very rational people."

4/25/12, The Guardian

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak:

"[Iran has] not yet decided to manufacture atomic weapons."

04/25/12, The Raw Story

Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta:

"Are they trying to develop a nuclear weapon? No. But we know that they're trying to develop a nuclear capability. And that's what concerns us. And our red line to Iran is do not develop a nuclear weapon. That's a red line for us."

2/8/12, Face the Nation

Director of National Intelligence James Clapper:

"We continue to assess Iran is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons in part by developing various nuclear capabilities that better position it to produce such weapons, should it choose to do so. We do not know, however, if Iran will eventually decide to build nuclear weapons.[…] We continue to judge Iran's nuclear decisionmaking is guided by a cost-benefit approach, which offers the international community opportunities to influence Tehran."

01/31/12, Unclassified Statement for the Record on the Worldwide Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community for the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence

Responding to question from Senator Lindsey Graham: "You have doubt about the Iranian's intention when it comes to making a nuclear weapon?"

JAMES CLAPPER:

I do […] I think they're keeping themselves in a position to make that decision but there are certain things they have not yet done and have not done for some time. [...]"

02/16/12, Senate Armed Services Committee

What do you and Congressman Ryan know that top Israeli and American officials do not?

And, if Congressman Ryan intends to "confront" Iran, how does he intend to do so? Is he going to put on a uniform and fly over there? Or is he going to order your sons and mine to do his bidding? Especially since Iran's so-called "nuclear program" is so far as real as Saddam's WMDs.

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The Observer's editorial board cares deeply about Charlotte and the Carolinas, and has a problem with public officials who have forgotten that they report to citizens. Editorial page editor Taylor Batten and associate editors Peter St. Onge and Eric Frazier tackle politics and public policy issues locally, across the state and nation. Kevin Siers tackles those issues too in cartoons. Read their columns and biographical information on the CharlotteObserver.com Opinion page.